Alexander Davila

For nearly four decades, Project Return has been solely dedicated to the people who are returning to the Nashville community after incarceration, facilitating job search, job placement, and job retention, as well as providing wraparound intensive case management and a broad array of assistance and support. Our effectiveness is amplified by entrepreneurship: Project Return operates two revenue-generating social enterprises. Through our first social enterprise, PRO Employment (PROe), we create jobs and hire people immediately. Since its inception in 2013, PROe has employed 517 people and has generated more than $1.8M in revenue. Our second social enterprise, PRO Housing, creates affordable rental homes for people who have successfully started new lives, through the acquisition, rehab, and preservation of affordable housing stock in Nashville. The funds utilized by Project Return represent money not spent on incarceration. The annual cost of imprisonment in Tennessee is approximately, $27,000 per person. Comparing Project Return's lower recidivism to the state's higher rate, and considering just the cost of imprisonment, the impact of Project Return in 2017 is approximately $3.3M in taxpayer dollars saved. Joblessness only magnifies the negative cycle of formerly incarcerated individuals going back to prison. By understanding the collateral consequences of a criminal conviction and choosing instead to support an individual's successful return to society through stable, full-time employment, Project Return serves as an important part of the solution to end mass incarceration.